Josh, Jenn, Ashton, and Emmy…

Thank you AGAIN, Mom, for making the next day of fun possible!!! She babysat all of our kids so we could go to Magic Mountain. It was really so nice to have a day without kids . We went to Josh’s favorite ride, X2, first. Man, I am getting so old because that ride was way too EXTREME for me. It makes me kind of sad. But for real, I thought I was going to fall right out of that thing and as the ride went on, I just got more and more scared. Anyhoo, my favorite ride is Goliath. As the ride got faster and more crazy, Josh grabbed my hand, turned to me and yelled “WIIIILL YOOOU MARRY ME!?!?!” You probably had to be there, but I threw my head back in laughter, as I tend to do. The g-forces grabbed my head and kept it back there for a while. With all my strength I pulled my head forward and the forces caught it again, throwing my head down into my lap where it stayed for the rest of the ride. Oh yes, and I laugh with my mouth open which is very bad when your head is flying all over the place…it’s good we were in the very last row….Roaring Rapids is always a good ride to go on when it’s 120 degrees outside. There’s a picture of Kris and her temporary boyfriend. I also love the one when she is truly concerned about her purse getting wet. Nate, we are all still very sorry for making you come on this ride with your phone in your pocket.

That night, my parents took us to our most favorite restaurant in the world, The Crab Pot. Josh and I discovered it when we were dating on our missions in Seattle. Doh! Juuuust kidding. But when we were dating and went BACK to Seattle we discovered it. There’s one in Seattle and one in Long Beach, right on the beach. They give you big bibs, a mallet and a wooden board and then they come dump a ton of seafood out of a bucket right in the middle of the table. That’s when all meyhem breaks loose as you try to eat any of it before my dad gets it all. He’s a pro seafood eater. Love you, Dad, it was so much fun!!! Thank you!!!

We drove down to San Diego on Friday to stay in a hotel so we could be closer to Sea World the next morning. There was a little rest stop near some kind of military base. We let the kids out to run around, watch helicopters, tanks and ships and feed the squirrels. That night we went swimming at the hotel and then went downtown to eat dinner.

And, of course, Sea World. What can I say, Sea World is just fabulous. Ashton and Druw got to feed Bat Rays with their very own tiny hands. We saw Shamu and dolphins and penguins. Ashton is very good at making new friends. There are a few pictures of him off being social.

We left Sea World and met my parents in downtown San Diego to go to a reception. It worked out so perfectly. We have been good friends with the Olson’s for almost 30 years and their daughter happened to be getting married the weekend we were in town. It was so great to see them. We love them so much! Congratulations, April!!!

I love the 4th of July, I mean, who doesn’t, right? There are so many fun things to do in Provo during the Freedom Festival, and most of it, it seems, requires us to wake up at unspeakable hours of the morning. Emmy and Ashton have the puffy morning eyes going on in lots of these pictures. They were troopers, though, and had a good time, even though they were tired and hungry for a few days.

We woke up early on the 3rd of July (hey, if we can start celebrating BEFORE the actual day, WHY NOT?!?!?!) to go see the hot air balloons take off. The kids loved it and it was fun to hang out with Jessi’s family. We all went to McDonald’s for breakfast afterwards, it was lots of fun.

On the 4th of July, we woke up early to run the 5K Freedom Run. (Thank you, Kyra, for lending us your stroller.) It was so much fun! Jess and Gary ran it with us and we all just took it easy and ran together and didn’t care about our times. And yes, Jessi is my sister who almost died in April and she ran the 5K. AMAZING!

The really great thing about running the 5K was that Josh and I weren’t in charge of securing a place for the family to watch the parade. (Thank you Vivian and Stephanie for taking on this crappy responsibility and doing an excellent job!)

You’ll notice that Ashton is wearing the same blue-striped shirt in pretty much all of our summer activity pictures. Yes, I had to swallow my pride and put my child’s safety first. If it hadn’t been for this shirt, who knows where Ashton might be right now. Probably marching down State Street in Lindon pretending to be playing a tuba in a band, STILL. So ever since the 4th of July Parade, whenever we go to a crowded public place where Ashton MIGHT wander off, I make him wear this shirt. Sorry, buddy.

After a little nap at home, we all went to Rob’s for a BBQ. Then the party moved on to the MTC field to hang out and wait for fireworks. We’ve been doing this since before my mission (if we are in town for the 4th) We just play Ultimate Frisbee, football, volleyball and eat lots of junk. It’s fabulous. Thank you, Uncle Gary, for the snowcones!!!

Ashton loves going to the Provo Veterans Pool. All year long, whenever we pass it, he says “There’s my pool!” The first time there this summer, he wore floaties on his arms. After an hour, he wanted them off. I was sooo scared to let him take them off, but I agreed and stood right next to him the rest of the day. The next time he just went crazy and was bobbing in and out of the water, holding his breath and loving it. By the end of that day, he would swim under the water holding his breath for a few seconds. It was amazing.

This was Emmy’s first time ever being in a pool and she was very scared. For the first hour, she was hugging me so tightly and burying her face in my shoulder. It was ALMOST like she loved me as much as she loves Josh…ALMOST. She has relaxed a lot, maybe too much, because now she tries to walk away from me and doesn’t like me to touch her.

After waiting and waiting for a nice, hot, Utah summer day, I finally decided to bust out the pool.  I was using our air mattress pump to blow it up at first but the batteries quickly died.  With no replacement batteries to be found, I sat on our stairs in the back yard and started to blow it up myself.  How hard could it really be?!?!?!  Oh my heavens!  I started out all confident and strong.  About five minutes later, I was just sitting all limp on the stairs with a huge headache, about to pass out, barely puffing into the valve, and there was no change in the size of the pool.  Then, I saw a bright light and heard a voice floating above me say “I have an air compressor.  Would you like me to blow that up for you?”  Angel, you ask?  Not technically, but YES!!!  It was our neighbor, Mike, standing on his deck next door saving my life!  So he blew the thing up in about 25 seconds.

That is Ashton’s pal, Mac.  More neighbors that I love.